Coffee is a contributing plant in the economy of Ruhango District, where it is heavily planted in Ntongwe and Mbuye areas.

Coffee farmers from this district reaffirm that, apart from coffee being a cash crop, it helps them develop themselves economically and socially, affirm COAKAMBU Cooperative members, while discussing with wazoplus.com how coffee has contributed to their development.

Marcel NSABIMANA, a coffee farmer and the president of COAKAMBU Cooperative, has told us he has been planting coffee for over 15 years and this has completely changed his life and his family's welfare.

He said:  “I have been doing this for over 15 years and it changed my life because there is a big difference between how my family and I used to live and how we are living today. I paid school fees for my children, built a house, and paid insurance for my family”.

He continued by saying that coffee has helped COAKAMBU, of which he is the president, build a coffee processing factory, while creating a market for it. From Their production, COAKAMBU bought a coffee processing machine worth 5,000,000 Rwandan francs and a 2,000,000 Rwandan francs worth coffe store.

Anicet NDIKUMANA, one of the employees at COAKAMBU factory said that getting employed in the factory has changed his life and that of his family that used to live in poverty. NKUNDIMANA says that he now owns a lot of livestock, all from this factory.

Established In 2008, COAKAMBU Cooperative Guaranteed permanent status in 2009 with 40 initial members, now they are 68.

COAKAMBU processing factory was built in 2012 in Mbuye sector, Nyakarekare cell. The factory produces 27 tons of dried coffee worth 54 million Rwandan Francs per season, based on the price per 1 kilogram of raw coffee, as established by National Agricultural Export development Board (NAEB)

 

According to NAEB, the country wanted to increase coffee exports to 20 thousands tons in 2016-2017, an increase 0f 3% in 2017, although according to the National Institute of Statistic’s report, the total gross production of the first quarter of 2020 was 2452 billion Rwandan Francs from 2152 billion of the first quarter of 2019. The report shows that the total gross production from Agricultural activities contributed 25%, while the report of the second quarter shows that they contributed 28%, whereas the export production dropped for 16%, with coffee dropping to 38% in the first quarter of 2020.

NAEB has also stated that the price for coffee processing factories should not exceed  248 per kilogram of raw coffee.